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21
Empathetic Understanding
and Feelings in
Cliententered Therapy
Barbara Temaner Brodley, Ph. D.
lllinois School of Professional Psychology
Chicago, lllinois, U.S.A.
Experiencedclient-centeredtherapists and other students of Carl
Rogers'theory of therapy generally
agree that the client-centered
conception of empathic understanding gives great
emphasis and
importance to the client's feelings in the therapy process.
Rogers'
writings about client-centered therapy include maior references to
feelings (e.9., Rogers, 1959). Concerning empathic understanding,
Rogers says that "the therapist senses accuratev the feelings and
personalmeanings
that the client is experiencing..." (Rogers, 1980,
p.
1 16). The
precise
meaning of "feelings" and the precise function
of the language of feelings, however, is not clearly articulaled by
Rogers and others when describing empathic understanding in
client-centeredtherapy. The meaning and the function of "feelings"
in regard to empathic understanding is, consequent[, somewhat
confusing to students. lt is particularfy
misunderstood when Rogers
isinterpretedto be advocatingthatthetherapist respondto the"hot"
emotions or feelings in the client's communication
(Zimring,
1990,
p.
a36). In fact, Rogers'conception of empathy is different and more
complex than simply responding to feelings. Rogers (1980) said:
...being empathic is to
perceivethe
internalframe of reference
of another with accuracy and with the emotionalcomponents
and meanings which pertain thereto...it means to sense the
hurt or the
pleasure
of another as he senses it and to
perceive
the causesthereof as he
perceivesthem...(p.
140).
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Client-centered empatlry refers to emphatic understanding ol the
client's entire internalframe of referencewhich includes
perceptions,
ideas, meanings and the emotional-affective components
connected
with these things as well as the client's feelings and
emotions
per se. A recent study I undertook wilh a doctoral student
(Brodley & B rody, 1 990; B rody, 1 991
)
attempts to elucidate Rogers'
conception
of client-centered therapy by examining Rogers'
empathic responses in a
group
of Rogers'own therapy interviews.
The results of the study, along wilh subsequent analysis of several
addilional
interviews by Rogers, shows that Rogers uses feeling
words
- words that explicitty designatefeelings or emotions - in only
twenty four
percent (24Yol
of his empathic responses.
Wefound
that Rogers useswords in his empathic responsesthat
are not feeling words in the
precise
sense but are words that
express dispositions
(such
as "prefer," "alienatg," "seduce"),
evaluations
(such as "denigrate," "value," "assess") and volitions
(such as "determine," "resist," "rejct") in approximately forty-eight
percent (48/"1 ol his empathic responses. On the basis of our
researchfindings
and carefulreading of Rogers'writings, it appears
to be more accurate, when discussing client-centeredempathy, to
talk in terms that do not over-generalizethe meaning of "feelings."
lnstead,
n seems to be more faitlrful to Rogers' theory and his
therapy
behavior to clarify that Rogers' empathic responses
emphasize
or explicitly state the client's perceotions
and the ways
in which the client is an aoerft or source of reactions. Rogers'
empathic
following of the client, we find, tends to
pick up on the way
in which the client is an aoencv or a source of what we have called
"actions of
personality" (Brodley
& Brody, 1990). The client as
agency is represented, of course, by expressions of feelings as well
as other experienceswhich constitute actions of
personality.
Our study found that approximately ninety
percent (907d
of
Rogers''
empathic following responses explicitty or implicitly
communicate
that Rogers is understanding the clieril as an agent
or source of reactions. Seventy
percent (7Oo/"1, approximately, are
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found to be explicit and approximately twenty percent (2o/ol are
implicitly or indirectly expressed. Another way of saying this is that
ninety percent (90%)
of Rogers' empathic responses either use
specific words that express actions of
personality (words
for
feelings, disposilions, evaluations, volilions or other forms) or they
implicitly or indirectly express actions of personalily
that represent
what the client has been communicating. We also found that
Rogers' clients correct his empathic responses less than one
percent (1./"1 of the times Rogers makes an empathic response to
them. From this observation, and the observation that Rogers'
clients frequently acknowledge the accuracy of his empathic
responses, we believe that Rogers' empathic respot)ses are
perceived as accurate by his clients most of the time. Consequently
it seems
justif
ied to infer that Rogers' clients feel understood largely
because he is
picking
up on the way they are expressing
themselvesas agents or sources ol reactions. And it is notablethat
feelings are only a portion of the clients' experiencesas agefts.
It seems correct to say that empathic understanding in client-
centered therapy is understanding of the client's perceptions
and
the client's self as agency. In therapy interaction, as the claent
discloses and lays out for the therapist his or her siluation, there is
(interspersed within, bef ore or aft erthe information about srtuations,
events,
people and things) communication concerning the client's
subjective reactions and subjective actions in relations to the
situations, etc. However, it is not untilthe client expresses his or her
reactions and subjective actions that the therapist has tho
information neededfor truly empathic understanding. lt may clarify
this point to
give
examples of different client communications whiclr
offer different kinds ol information relevant to the
question
of what
makes understanding truly empathic understanding. Rogers
produces
empathic responses that are purely
information about
situations, events,
people or things in approximately five
percent
(5%) of his empathic following responses. Such
pure inlormation
responses are, usualV, responses to client statements which are
23
THE PERSON-CENTERED JOURNAL
squally
purev informational. These client statements do not reveal
the client's reac{ions or any otherform of the client's relataonto what
lte or she is talking about. An example of a client statement that
corueys only information abotrt events is as follows: "He called me
up at work and wanted to see me again."
It should be apparentthat this statement, in itself, does not
give
expression to the client's feelings or other possible reactions to or
about this went. lt is
possible,
and is often the case, that such a
"pure"
informationaltype statement by a client does corvey the
client's reactions
I
the client has
previously
informed the therapist
about the meaning thb everil has had in the
past
or about the
meaning ihe client
predicts
it will have il it occurs in the future. But,
standing alone it does not tellthe listenerwhat it meansto the client,
or what reactions the client is having to the event.
The information offered strictly within the client statement
mentioned above does not provide
the kind of information that
permits true empathic understanding of the client at that moment.
The client-centered therapist miglrt offer a following type of
rgsponse of the type our research has classified as a "pure
ililormation" empathic following response, such as "He called." As
rnentioned above, Rogers occasionally
produces this type of
response. But it appearsto serve almost the same role as "umhum,"
"OK,"
and "yeah"
responses which simply signalthe therapist is
attentive and aftempting to follow. A slightty different client
sitatement, than the one illustrated above, that
gives
some slight
information that could be the basis for true empathic understanding
is as follows: He finallv called me up and wanted to see me again.
The "finally" communicates some degree of the client's reaction
to the event. However, it does not express enough information to
k now exactly what experiences (meanings, feelings, other reactions)
are alluded to in the "finally." The therapist migltt make a true
empathic
response to this communication, although it would be
limited in its differentiationof meanings. The therapist might respond
by saying "Finally!"
which could communicate to the client the
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therapist's sense that the client had sorne strong feelings about the
call and that the client had been waiting to hear from the man.
Alternatively, the client-centered therapist migtrt simply absorb
the {inally," maintain empathic attention to the client and wait for
more material that expresses the ctient's reactions, thoughts,
feelings, or whatever other form of the client's agency might be
expressed. The following example of a client statement expresses
information that is differentiated in respect the client's reactions and,
consequently makes it possible
for the therapist to empathically
understand the client in the moment.
Client: He called me up at work and wanted to see me again.
(pause) Finally! (pause) | was so busy I couldn't talk
but a minute, but I was emotionally allover the
place
and couldn't concentratefor tlle rest of the afternoon.
(pause) I'm such a sap! He's a complete ass hole, but
I'm dying to see him.
Putting aside the organization and thrust of the client's agency
in this example, the elements that could contribute to true
gmpathic
understanding of the client are: "Finally!;" emotionally all over the
place;"
"couldn't concentrate;" "1'm
suclr a sap!;' "He's a complete
ass hole;" "1'm dying to see him." Notably, none of these statements
directly and explicitly state a feeling, although the client's entire
statement is pregnant with allusion to the expression of feelings.
There are several
possible
empathic responses which a therapist
might make to check his or her understanding of what the client has
been expressing. One possible
response is:
Therapist: You feelyou're a loolto want a person who upsets yorr
so badly, br-rt...you do want hinr!
Another response, that migfrt express and clrcck the therapist's
inner empathic understanding is:
25
26
THE PERSON.CENTERED JOURNAL
Therapist: You
got
what you were waiting for, but it brings with it
a lot of mixed feelings.
Only the client can tell us which ol those responses feel most
accurate, but it is likely that eitherof them, on facevalue, would be
accepted by the client as representing the therapist's sincere
intentions to try to understand. The important
point, in the
illustrations, is that the client's statements revealed her reactions,
her aoency. in respect to the situation of being called and in the
conte!ft of the call, and it was these elements in what she said that
permitted an experience of and an act of empathic understanding
on this therapist's
part.
Most of Rogers' responses to his clients express his immediate
grasp of the client's reactions to, or agency in respect to, what the
client is talking about. As noted above, a small
percentage
of
Rogers' responses are
purely
informational following responses,
such as "He called you." Information responses are occasional
forms of response that occur in a client-centered therapist's
sequence of empathic following interactions with a client. Brrt this
form of response would not be likely to be experiencedas empathic
understanding if this form were th on! form of response in the
ifieraction. The reality of, and the client's perception of, empathic
understanding depends upon the therapist communicating his or
her understanding of th aspects of the client's communication in
which the client is directly or indirectly expressing his or her relation
to their situation and, in that way, expressing his or her self as
aoency
-
self as actor or reactorto the situations being disclosed.
Intention of the Therapist and an Effect of Emoathy
The client-centeredtherapist's immediate intention when making
an empathic respons is to check, test or verify the accuracy ol his
or her subjective empathic understanding. This is done by making
a statement that represents the therapist's inner understanding,
THE PERSON.CENTERED JOURNAL
presenting it to the client for the client's verilication, correction or
motrvation
(Rogers, 1 986). A clear and obvious effect of a sequence
of interactions between client and therapist, in which the therapist
makes empathic understanding responses, is that the client
elaborates and reveals more of his or her
phenomenalworld
to the
therapist. Empathic understanding responsestend to lacilitate more
client communication concerning his or her self, srtuations and
experiences. There is, in addnion to the facilitative effect mentioned,
another effect upon clients of the therapist empathically following.
This observed effect isthat clientstend to becomemore consistently
and intently focused on and expressive of the experientialsource ot
what they are talking about.
ln other words, there is a focusing effect of client-centered
empathic work, even though this is not the intention of the therapist
when making empathic responses. The focusing effect of therapist
empathic understanding can be considered desirablef rorn the point
of view of Rogers' process version of change in client-centered
therapy (Rogers, 1958, 1961; 1980; Gendlin, 1964). lt nlr6t be
emphasized, however, that although the locusing effect is notable
and may be considered theoretically desirable
-
the focusing effect
on the client is not deliberately intended by the therapist and is not
the reason the therapist makes an empathic response. The
empathic intention of lhe client-centeredtherapist is to acceptantly
understand. Rogers is very clear in his writings that the client-
centered therapist has no
goals
for his or her clients. The therapist's
goalsarestrictly goalsfor him or herself
-
to experienceand offerthe
aftitudinal conditions of congruence, unconditional positive regard
and empathic understanding in the relationship with the client
(Baldwin, 1986,
p. 47). The focusing eflect ol empathic
understanding is serendipitous even though
predictable.
27
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JOURNAL
fie Connections Between True Emoahy,
Feelinqs and Experiencing
The therapist's acts of true empathic understanding, in
themselves, tend to stimulate clients to be in touch with the
underlying experiefiialsource of their self-disclosures and self-
representations. The client hearsthe therapist's empathic response
and checks his or her experiencing to find out whether or not the
therapist's
perception
of the client is consistent with what the client
was trying and meaning to express. Rogers states that this
phenomenon
is based on a charac'teristic
of human functioning. He
says:
...at alltimes there is going
on in the human organism a flow of
experiencing to which the individual can turn again and again as
a referent in order to discover the meaning of those experiences
(Rogers, 1980,
p.
141).
Thb checking with the flow of experiencing is not a self-conscious
process for most
people.
Whether or not the client is conscious of
thb checking
process,
the client-centeredtherapist plays
a rolethat
enhances thb natural
process.
In client-centered interactions the therapist articulates his or her
grasp
of the client's disclosure. This anempt to find out il his or her
subjeave empathic understanding is accurate or not stimulates
the clierfi towards awareness of the
qualities
and contents of his or
her own experiencing. The key element in this stimulation ot
awarenessof experiencing is the emphasis on the client as agent -
actor and reactor. In any interaction, if we are trying to understand
the other empathical!, we find ourselves making statements that
include refererrces to the other as agent such as "you want,"
"yolJ
feel," "you think," "you know," "you reject," "you wonder," "you werg
full of conflicting reactions," etc. In these referenceswe ask the other
person
to attend to themself as a source and thereby attune the
person
to their source
- what Rogers calls
"experiencing"
(Rogers,
THE PERSON.CENTERED JOURNAL
1959). Withorrt attending to experiencing, the other person cannot
authentically agree nor disagree with our empathic statement.
The checking within
process, that is stimulated frequently by the
therapist's empathic responses, is a focusing act on the part
of the
client. Such focusing acts recur over and over in the client-centered
empathic following
process. To the extent the externalfoci (such as
the therapist's ideas about the client), the
process
of empathic
following facilitates the client's focus on his or her experiential
source and ont he client's self as agency. Another observation from
our researchthat cortributes to clarrfying the connection between
empathy, experiencing and feelings in client-cerfteredtherapy is that
Rogers uses the words "feel,"
"feels," "f eeling," and "feelings" in more
than half of his empathic following responses. He does so .n
responses that do not include words or
phrases
that communicate
specific feelings. Examples of the usage ot
'feel,'
etc. in Rogers
interviews are as follows:
29
Rogers:
Rogers:
Rogers:
Rogers:
You feelthere's so little charrce of anyone else really
understanding
you. (Dione)
You'd like to be aware of your feelings aborrt these
demands, right at the time they happen instead of
having bright thoughts afterwards. (Munn)
You feelat a state. And when you
work througlr some
ol the other things in the backgrourrd, that may
straighten out too.
(Eft)
A really contradictory feelirrg that
'l
don't want to be a
personwho
just gives into alldemandsand, yet,leeling
"that's the only chance I have of being loved." (Munn)
These examples ol Rogers' empathic r esponses illustrate that he
uses the words "feel," etc., in severalways in his responses. One
way he uses these words is as synonynts for "think,"
'believe,'
"imagine,"
"know." or "perceive, etc. This synonym usage carries
the message ttrat there are emotions or feelings or
"emotional
THE PERSON.CENTERED JOURNAL
components" associated with the client's thoughts, beliefs, etc.,
although they are not xplicitly stated. A second way Rogers uses
the words "teel," etc., in his empathic responses, is to referto an
inner experience
-
in the realm of experiencing
-
of the client withorrt
naming it. For example:
Rogers: You'd like to be aware of your
feelings about...
A third way Rogers uses "feel," etc., in empathic responses is to
refer to an experience that Rogers does express in the
particular
empathic response, although the experience is not expressed with
a work for feeling. For example:
Rogers: A...feeling that I don't want to be a
personwho
jr.rst glves
in...
ln this usageof "feeling,"what is referredto inthe client'sexperience
is not expressiblewith aword lorfeeling becausethe experienceis
too complex or involves meanings that evoke feelings for which, in
English at any rate, there are no single words.
Another way Rogers uses the words "feel," etc., is as an
introduction to an empathic following response. The empathic
response itself may or may not include words for feelings,
dispositions, evaluations, volitions or other kinds of agency words.
Introductions with "feel," etc., are heuristic or at least expressive of
the way the remainder of th empathic response refers to
experiencing. Each of the usages of "feel," etc., which are so
frequent in Rogers' empathic responses tend to attune the client to
the client's own experiencing. The usages taks advantage of the
way in which "feel," etc. allude to a source of responses in the self
within the English language. This is not to suggest that Rogers is
consciously trying to direct or instruct his clients to anend to
experiencing. Rather, it is a
panern
of verbal behavior that does,
along with the agency feature of empathic responses, contribute to
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THE PERSON-CENTERED JOURNAL
the observation that client-centeredwork has the etfect of attuning
clients to their own experiencing.
9rmmary
There is more to client-centered empathy that discriminating the
client's feelings out of the matrix of the client's communications. The
goalof therapist empathic understanding requires the therapist to
perceivethe
client's representatbns of his or her self as an agent
-
as an actor and reactor in the subjective realm. Understandings are
not truv empathic in any situation unless the agency element in the
person's communication is perceived. A major naturaleffect on the
client of being empathically understood is a focusing effect.
Empathic anunement stimulates the
person who perceives they are
being understood in the way to attend to their own experiencing and
to represent themself more acutely from their experiencing, The
emphasis on the client as agent in empathic responses is key to the
focusing effect.
In addilion to the focusing effect of empathic recognition of the
client as agent, the ways in which Rogers uses the words "feel,"
"fgels," "feeling," "feelings" tend to allude to and anune the claent to
his or her experiencing. Both of these features of Rogers' empathy
revealRogers attentionto the client as agent and anunementto the
client's experientialsource in his relationships with his clients. lt is
crucialfor correct understanding of Rogers' therapy, however, to
realize that these focusing effects in Rogers (and in other client-
centeredtherapists') behaviorarenot techniques. Nor should these
phenomena be adopted as techniques for, lf they are, then the
therapist has stepped outside of clientcenteredtherapy. lt is hoped
that these observations may clarify the nature of empathic
understanding and the role of feelings in client-centeredtherapy.
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Refercrrce
Baldwin, M.
(1987). Interview with Carl Rogers on the use of self in
therapy. In M, Baldwin and V. Satir (Eds.) The Use of Self in
Therapy, New York: The Hawthorn Press.
Brodley, 8., & Brody, A. (1990). Understanding client-centered
therapy through interviews conducted by Carl Rogers. Paper
presented for the panel Fifty Years of Client-Centered Therapy:
Recent Research, at American Psychological Association annual
meeting in Boston, MA, August.
Brody, A. F. (1991). A study of ten ifierviews conducted by Carl
Rogers. Clinical Research Paper in the
partial fulfillment of
requirementsfor the Psy. D. at the lllinois School of Professional
Psychology, Chicago, lllinois.
Gendlin, E. T.
(1964).A theory of personalitychange. In P. Worchel
and D. Byrne
(Eds.), Personality Change, New York: John Wiley
& Sons.
Rogers, C. R.
(1958). A
process
conception of
psychotherapy.
American Psychologist, 13,'142'149. Rogers, C. R. (1959). A
theory of therapy,
personality,
and interpersonal relationships
as developed in the client-centeredframework. In S. Koch
(Ed).,
Psycholoqt: A Study of a Science. Vol. lll, Formulations of the
Person in the SocialContext. New York: McGraw Hill.
Rogers, C. R.
(1961). A
process
conception of
psychotherapy. ln
OarlRogers, On Eecominga Person. Boston: Houghton Mifflin.
Rogers, C. R.
(1980). Empathic: An unappreciatedway of being. In
CarlRogers, A Way of Berhg. Boston: Houghton Mifflin.
Rogers, C. R.
(1980).
The foundations of a
person-centered
approach. In Carl Rogers, A Way of Being. Boston: Houghton
Mifflin.
Rogers, C. R.
(1986),
Reflection of feelings. Persor+Centered
Revieul.375-377.
Zimring, F.
(1990). A characteristic of Rogers' response to clients.
Perso* C entered Review, 5, 433-448,
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